Review In A Hurry: After almost dying during Avengers, Tony has been suffering from PTSD. So when he finds himself being hunted by A new evil, The Mandarin, he is caught at a vulnerable time. He’s forced to be a stripped down version of himself, hiding in a small town while at the same time investigating how the Mandarin is causing such destruction. Teaming him up with a kid was a genius move, it not only made Stark relatable it also made him sympathetic.

Unfortunately the ending climax didn’t have enough heart to it, and a big plot point was basically looked over diminishing its emotional impact.

I wanted it to be a better movie than it was, but at times it felt like a jumbled mess. Though it took some interesting twists and turns, in the end, the villain just wasn’t that terrifying. While it got Tony Stark right, it seemed to get a lot else wrong.Rating: 3 Stars

Sometimes I wish the villain you think is the villain is the actual villain because unless its done right, often times the true force behind everything isn’t very exciting. Plus this thematic repetition gets old seeing it in movie after movie. (See Iron Man, White House Down The Dark Knight Rises).

Kirk is becoming unlikable. I know he has to grow up. I know that’s the moral to the story, but in this movie I found him annoyingly arrogant. I want to see him be more of a leader than whiny teenager. Self pity is not appealing.

What I liked:

J.J. does character so well. No matter what you think of the characters, he gives each of them a developmental arch. Even the smallest of characters. This why you not only care about them because you know them, you care about them because you do.

Great emotional beats. I shed a tear nearing the end of the movie. And the twist to the original version was pretty damn cool.

Visuals – I like JJ’s lens flares. I do. I think his camera work is so great. And he works well with the 3D with out making it cheesy. Those arrows coming at you in the opening sequence were genius whether you watched it in 3D or 2D.

Star Trek was an overall top-notch movie that I need to see again. JJ took a new twist on an old classic that was fun and fresh at the same time.